


shimmer in the sunlight

by burnsidesjulia



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Coming In Pants, Dirty Talk, Dorks in Love, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Smut, Grinding, Heatwave, Marriage Proposal, Mid-Canon, Sexual Fantasy, i mean. i /guess/ that's what it is, literally so much fluff, not complaining. just commenting, this got way sappier than i meant it to at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-13
Updated: 2019-07-13
Packaged: 2020-06-27 13:59:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19792339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnsidesjulia/pseuds/burnsidesjulia
Summary: The Amnesty Lodge’s AC is broken during the biggest heatwave Kepler, West Virginia has felt since 1917, more than 100 years ago.Aubrey cools down. Dani offers a distraction.





	shimmer in the sunlight

It has been apparent since the moment she woke up that today was going to be uncomfortably warm. Aubrey woke up sweating, the sheets cloying and sticky near the skin her pushed up tank top had exposed. She washed her face with cold water and padded downstairs sans socks or slippers, a rarity due to the general temperature of the floor around here. Downstairs, Aubrey elects to drop a few cubes of ice into the hot coffee that Barclay poured her and call it good. Still too warm to be consumed in one gulp, Aubrey sips at her coffee as the radio behind the breakfast bar calls for record-smashing temperatures, inching up through the hundreds and nearing 115 on the fahrenheit scale. Barclay takes a slurp of his own coffee.

“That’s certainly too bad,” he remarks, eyebrows raised. Aubrey nods sympathetically. “Tell me about it. I run hot all the time as it is.” She pats the side of her mug. “At least I’ve got my good old friend, iced beverages.” Barclay pulls his lips up into a tight line and shakes his head. “I’m afraid that probably won’t do you good enough in this heat, Aubrey. I was around last time it got this hot, you know. Kepler natives start dropping like flies when it hits 95.”

“I’ll be fine,” Aubrey assures him. “I’ve got another good friend and his name is air conditioning.” She pauses. “Or her. You know, I actually don’t want to make any assumptions.”

Barclay stands off of the countertop he’s leaning against, seemingly ignoring her comment in favor of seeking out his shoes. “Uh-huh. About that, Aubrey? There’s something I’ve been meaning to do for a while now.”

“Yeah?” She watches in confused, but intrigued silence as he laces up his boots. “What’s that?” Barclay clears his throat for no particular reason, and she watches as his eyes ping pong around the room. “I’ve, uh. Gotta go into town. Buy a piece for our AC.”

“Oh, like to upgrade it. Good timing. We’ll have, like, super AC now, right, or is that how that works?”

Barclay shakes his head. “No, Aubrey, it’s to fix it. Our AC ain’t running right now.” He starts lacing the other boot. “I’ve been meaning to get around to it, but it just never gets hot enough.” He shrugs slightly. “At least this gives me a reason to do it.”

“Oh.” Aubrey pauses for a moment, just as the real heat of the room sinks into her bones. She feels exhausted and sluggish down into her core, and it hasn’t even hit nine in the morning. “I mean, it’ll be all better by noon, though, and that’s when it gets hottest.”

“Wishful thinking, Miss Aubrey Little.” He stands now, brushing imaginary lint from his pants. “Gonna be an all day job if not more. You’ll have to do without it.” He turns and leaves the room. Aubrey takes a mournful sip from her now watery coffee. Her brain and body feel slow, but never too slow to think of a solution to the problem at hand. And that’s how Aubrey winds up laying face down on the wooden floor in her room, limbs splayed out like roadkill and her shirt rucked up to press bare skin to the flooring.

It doesn’t work well, in all honesty. If the floor were concrete, maybe, but all the wooden floor does for her is make her wary of splinters. It doesn’t work well but it works more than nothing, and she’s sweaty all over and bored as hell but too exhausted by the heat to actually do anything.

Aubrey has never done heat well. It’s always made perfect sense for her to live where she lives because it doesn’t _get_ hot here, but it’s hot right now and she’s certain that she’s dying. She’s dying, or she’s already died and this is what actual literal Hell is like.

There’s a rap on her door, short and sharp, and she knows who it is. At another temperature, she’d leap to her feet and answer it with arms open, lips pursed and expecting a kiss. At this temperature, however, it’s all she can do to groan aloud, even the effort of making sound nearly too much. The person on the other side of the door, fortunately, is well attuned to Aubrey’s multitude of noises that get made in place of words, and they come in regardless. The door opening bumps Aubrey in the side, and she squeezes her eyes shut tight and rolls away from it. She’s on her back now with her head tilted to the door, prime to see light purple toenails and freckles, light blonde hair on thin ankles. One of those feet nudges her.

“Has my girlfriend died?” Dani asks, a bubbly quality to her voice that Aubrey cannot even begin to fathom in this inferno. Aubrey groans again and tosses an arm over her eyes. Dani stoops beside her, one eye pressed to the floor and the other examining Aubrey carefully. “Hmm, I can’t seem to tell. Further measures will have to be taken.” Aubrey feels herself starting to smile. Just as she’s letting her guard down Dani’s hands are on her sides, fingers flexing and skating across the skin and she shrieks, moves faster than she could have possibly imagined moving in this state. She shoots upright so quickly that she almost collides with Dani’s chin, Dani just barely avoiding it with her learned reflexes. Dani smiles. “Decidedly not dead. That’s good. Tickling a corpse would be kinda weird.”

“Fuck off,” Aubrey groans, no real malice in her words. She presses her forehead into the bare skin of Dani’s shoulder. “Can’t you see I’m dying here? I can’t be put up to physical activity, too.” Dani does pause at that, brushing a hand back through the definitely sweaty tuft of hair at Aubrey’s forehead. “God, babe, you’re burning up. Are you doing alright?”

“Doing, yes. Alright, no.” Aubrey rolls back onto the floor, smushing her cheek against the floor in search of any coolness that might be found upon it. “It’s better down here, though.”

Dani furrows her eyebrows and leans back, pushing the door closed. When it clicks into place, she lays herself down beside Aubrey, facing her. “Barclay said the AC’ll be all fixed up by tonight, at least.”

“Well that’ll be exciting, given I don’t melt into a puddle before then.” Dani rolls her eyes. “It’s not that bad, darlin’. You’re really just gonna lay here and do nothing all day?” Aubrey ponders that for a moment. “When you put it that way, it sounds like a pretty bad plan.”

“You’re only dying because you’re not distracted,” Dani assures her, smiling just enough that the dimple pops in her left cheek. Aubrey raises her eyebrows. “Distract me, then. Do your worst.”

“We could play cards. A board game. Something low energy.” Aubrey shakes her head. “No way. I get bored of those too easy. Pun intended.”

“Yeah, I should’ve known that. You could do my makeup again, that’s always fun.”

“You’d just sweat it off,” Aubrey points out. Dani scrunches up her nose like she does when she thinks, and Aubrey runs a gentle thumb over the wrinkle there. Dani is so cute. If Aubrey’s brain wasn’t just hot soup right now, she’d tell her that. Dani catches her hand and kisses the inside of her wrist, examining the chipped nailpolish on her fingers. “I could paint your nails.”

“Nothing that involves sitting up,” Aubrey says, and Dani lets loose a sigh that could rattle the windows with its force. “You’re not making this easy for me, you know.”

“You don’t have to think of something right now, Dani. Just lay here and luxuriate in the slight temperature difference on the floor.” Dani’s mouth opens like she’s going to say something but she shuts it just as fast, situating herself on the floor beside Aubrey, a little closer than she was before. Aubrey sighs, content in the presence of her favorite, favorite person, and closes her eyes again. Less than a minute passes before she feels a soft, fluttering kiss pressed to her closed eyelid, then to the apple of her cheek, and then to her ear. She peels her eyes open against the bone-deep feeling of exhaustion and finds Dani propped up on an elbow over her, a small smile playing over her lips.

“What’re you up to?” Aubrey asks, and the way Dani says, “Nothing,” definitely means no good. Regardless, it feels nice and Aubrey isn’t going to argue. She closes her eyes again and focuses on the thrum of her own heartbeat, the trail of kisses brushing over her chin and cheeks and jaw, trailing dangerously down her neck and into the curve of her clavicle. Aubrey opens her eyes again but doesn’t say anything, just stares at a poster on her wall as Dani’s kisses grow heavier, skating up and down the line of her throat. Aubrey can’t help the shiver that runs through her, and then Dani’s hands are bracketing her shoulders.

“You good?” She asks, and Aubrey puts her own hands atop Dani’s. “Yeah, I’m great. Just wanna say, if your intent is to cool me down, you’re actually doing a really shitty job. I definitely feel hotter.”

“I’m trying to distract you,” Dani corrects, and Aubrey rolls her eyes. “Oh, bite me.”

“As you wish.” Before Aubrey can actually respond to that Dani’s teeth are scraping skin, too soft to mark but enough to be _felt_ , and whatever words that were on Aubrey’s tongue are drawn backward into a gasp. Dani laughs against her skin, her breath almost cool on the sweat beading up there.

“You’re a jerk,” Aubrey says, but they both know she doesn’t mean it. Dani kisses the corner of her mouth. “I’ll stop if you don’t want it,” she says, all seriousness, and Aubrey just laces up their fingers between their bodies. “Absolutely not,” she reassures her, and the second the words are out Dani’s got her mouth back on her neck.

Aubrey’s skin is dark enough that Dani can’t make any marks that’d actually be too obvious, and she seems to be both well aware of and taking advantage of this fact. She peppers kisses in between hickies, draws her tongue across the skin to soothe the bites she leaves. She smacks her lips as she pulls back. “Salty,” she says, and Aubrey is slightly offput by the thought of her own sweat. She squeezes Dani’s hand. “It’s okay?” She asks, and Dani squeezes back. “ _Very_ okay. In fact, I think I want to…” She trails off, using her empty hand to pull one of the straps of Aubrey’s tank top back off her shoulder, electing to leave it dangling uselessly beside her bicep. She pushes closer again and the slight cool of her breath is so welcome. She licks a long, long stripe across Aubrey collar bone, down to the dip of her throat and then lower, her hand pulling downward on Aubrey’s top with only slight success. She gets it low enough that she can dip her tongue down between Aubrey’s breasts, and while the action itself isn’t particularly stimulating it’s the promise of what’s to come that has Aubrey breathing heavy, the hand that isn’t holding Dani’s scrabbling for purchase on her sweat-slick shoulderblades.

“I think it’d help you cool off if you lost the shirt,” Dani points out, and Aubrey lets go of her hand to hold her arms above her head. “Too hot to do it myself,” she reasons. Dani’s hands go to the hem of her tank top and peels it up slowly, almost reverently, like every inch of skin that she’s revealing is a form of prayer. That’s the real reason why Aubrey let Dani take the shirt off for her. She doesn’t think she’ll ever get tired of seeing that look in her eyes.

Dani’s hands go to the soft parts around Aubrey’s hips, short nails biting into flesh just a little. Meanwhile, her mouth resumes its previous ministrations at the very swell of Aubrey right breast, slowly but surely moving closer to the cup of her bra and then under, fingers fumbling blindly for just a moment before rolling a nipple between her fingers with practice that only Dani has. The heat is absolutely blinding and Aubrey’s whole body has gone lax, just allowing herself to be moved around as Dani sees fit. Dani’s breath is coming a little labored now, fanning out along the damp surface of Aubrey’s skin.

“Can we take this off, too?” She asks, and Aubrey nods shortly before pausing and shaking her head. Dani stops all movement immediately, eyes flooding with concern, and Aubrey realizes what she must think and laughs. “I meant, you need to lose some clothes first, too.”

“Oh.” Dani’s smile returns quickly and she pulls her t-shirt up over her head and discards it to the floor. Aubrey puts her hands flat to her toned belly, feeling all that muscle bunched up in there, such a quiet strength about her. Dani’s already reaching behind Aubrey to undo her bra, and Dani isn’t wearing one, and the heat in this room feels thicker by the moment, like moving through molasses. Dani takes initiative and rolls Aubrey onto her back, kneeling halfway over her and licking around the hardened bud of her nipple. Aubrey’s body stretches out, near boneless with pleasure, and Dani starts planting kisses again, over both sides of her ribcage and the fat on her hips and belly, smothering her with love. Aubrey takes it upon herself to kick her shorts down her legs, flinging them away without a care in the world. Dani caresses her through her panties with two fingers, smirks into her skin. “You’re wet,” she comments, as if this weren’t the most obvious statement in the world, and then she presses her fingers into her own mouth for just a moment. That’s all the action she takes, her mouth returning to toy with the skin just below Aubrey’s ear. The heat is so intense that Aubrey’s moan feels muffled in the air, like it hits a wall and disappears beyond it.

Dani presses back in for a real kiss then, and it’s so unlike the kisses they began with. It’s messy and their teeth click with the intensity but neither make an effort to correct the angle, too caught up in the flash flood that is their love. Aubrey would drown for this, would burn or freeze or die any number of deaths for this exact moment.

Dani takes off her own shorts and she’s not visibly wet through her underwear but she’s touching herself, mouth focused on tasting every inch of Aubrey’s skin. Aubrey watches the way she rubs circles into her clit over fabric and she could be content like that, watching her girlfriend get off, but then Dani’s pressing her thigh up between her legs and, well, who is she to deny an offer like that. She pushes her own thigh up for Dani and they shift their hips slightly, certainly moving no faster than a snail’s pace but it's _enough_ right now. Dani locks their hands together again, both this time, and hold herself up over Aubrey like that. She stares down at her face, mouth parted in what might be awe, and it’s almost embarrassing until it’s funny, and both of them start to giggle at nearly the same time.

“Oh, god, Aubrey. This is silly, isn’t it?”

“Mhm.” Aubrey sucks in a massive breath. “I think you’re doing a good job distracting me.”

“If you’re still thinking about being distracted, I must not be doing my job well enough.” Dani moves in like she’s doing a push up, lips against Aubrey’s but not quite kissing. She licks against her mouth, both of them breathing heavy and hot and hard. Dani starts kissing her proper, though Aubrey isn’t sure when, and she’s biting at her lip and tugging it back, allowing it to snap back into place before worrying it between her teeth again. If Dani is worried about drawing blood she doesn’t show it as she carries on, her hips snapping rhythmically against Aubrey’s thigh. Dani’s motions jar her thigh up against Aubrey too and so she scarcely has to move to get the friction she needs. In fact, it almost feels like, as Dani’s hip are moving, that she’s _fucking_ her, and the idea of Dani actually being inside her right now draws a noise from her that’s she’s not proud of. Dani grins, pulls back and puts her lips to Aubrey’s ear. “You make such pretty, pretty noises,” she croons, and Aubrey lets loose another little gasp. Dani nods immediately. “Just like that. I love the way you sound when we fuck. When you talk at all. God, Aubrey, I just love _you._ ”

Aubrey’s mouth falls open, breath coming out in short pants. “I love you, too,” she answers, reflex, and she laughs, trying to shake back sweat-slick hair from her face. “God. We’re really going to come like this, huh.”

“Mhmm,” Dani drawls. “Just like this. In our pants. Like horny teenagers.”

“If I’d known you as a teenager, my life would’ve been very different,” Aubrey laughs.

“Oh, I would’ve shown you a _thing_ or two.” Dani’s movements have slowed to a grind, her hips making circles as she gets closer to her climax. Her eyes are squeezed shut, but her mouth is still very much functional. “Mm.” She takes in a deep breath through her nose. “Would’ve had you coming like this every night.”

“Oh god, Dani,” Aubrey barely breathes. Her hips are jerking against Dani’s thigh.

“Maybe not every night. Sometimes on my tongue, or my fingers. Would’ve treated you real nice.”

“Dani… oh, Dani…”

“Just like that, baby,” she breathes. “I’d’ve had you crying out for me.”

Aubrey squeezes her hands. “Dani, _please_. I’m so close, I need…”

“Take whatever you need, darling. No hands, though.” She tightens her grip on Aubrey hands. “Try just a little harder. You can come like this.”

Aubrey’s mouth has become a music box that plays vague, clipped off fragments of Dani’s name and pleas. She’s _trying_ , really, her hips stuttering and aching with the effort and everything is so hot that it feels like a sauna between their skin and still she just can’t, it’s not enough and she’s so fucking close it hurts.

“God, look at you, writhing under me. You’re a sight and a half.” Aubrey shakes her head at nothing in particular, her eyes closed tight and her hands slipping against Dani’s with the building sweat. Everything burns brighter, feels sharp like a knife’s edge and she just needs a little more.

“Oh god, Dani, talk to me, I’m almost there.” Aubrey presses her sweaty forehead into Dani’s. The words all came out in one jumbled rush but Dani understands, nodding and pausing for just a moment before carrying on.

“Just imagine it, Aubrey, me and you in a twin-sized bed, touching ourselves under the covers…”

“Dani…”

“We’d… oh god, we’d show each other how we like being touched. Guide each other’s hands.”

“Dani, I-”

“Fuck, Aubrey, I’d do _anything_ for you. I still would.” Dani gasps, pressing Aubrey’s hands more firmly against the floor as her hips speed. “I’d look at you, Aubrey, and I’d say, look at her. My first love. My… god. My future wife.”

Aubrey comes with a start, shocking the both of them, a full moan ripping from her throat that anyone _definitely_ could’ve heard downstairs. Aubrey brings the union of her hand to her mouth to bite at their knuckles as she rides it out, her hips jumping with aftershocks as Dani tries to bring herself to the edge, too. She smiles down at Aubrey, whose teeth are still biting into her skin. “Can I break my own rule? I think I need…”

“Make yourself come, Dani, _please_ ,” Aubrey says, and she lets go of Dani’s hand. Just as quickly, Dani’s fingers are rubbing quick circles over the fabric, her hand trapped between their bodies and she’s trembling and then stilling and letting out a deep, deep sigh of relief. Aubrey, meanwhile, is staring up at the ceiling.

_Wife._

Dani rolls off of her, boneless and completely sated, and Aubrey is vaguely aware of how sweaty she is and how her underwear are all sticky and gross. She doesn’t care, can’t care. She turns her head to look at Dani, who isn’t even looking back. Her _wife._

Dani must feel her heavy gaze because she turns, and whatever she sees in Aubrey’s expression makes her smile. “Hey, wide-eyes. What’s the deal?”

“Your wife,” Aubrey blurts. Well, there’s something to be said for being direct. Dani’s eyebrows furrow, and then lift with understanding. Her face darkens a shade or two. “Oh, that. I mean, sorry if I. Came on too, uh. Strong.” She scratches her head. “It, just, you know. It slipped.”

“But, I…” Aubrey swallows against the tacky feeling in her throat. “But, did you mean it?”

Dani’s eyes go wide. She smiles. And then she laughs, and Aubrey’s heart goes crashing to her toes.

Dani must see the reaction, because her hands are on her immediately, smoothing over bare skin. “Aubrey, no, I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just… you and me have always felt so obvious, I guess I was just taking it as a given.”

“A given?” Aubrey repeats, and Dani nods. “Yeah. I mean, this whole time, I just figured… I mean, I guess I never really asked, did I?”

“You want to ask?”

“Of course I want to ask, Aubrey.” Dani pulls her hand to her lips. “I’d be fucking honored to spend the rest of my life with you.”

“I’d marry you,” Aubrey responds, and it doesn’t really sink in what she’s saying until she hears herself say it. She feels a big wobbly smile tugging at her lips. “Oh my god. I’d marry you, Dani.”

“Well, I’d marry you harder,” Dani answers, and that’s _stupid_ but it’s Dani who’s saying it and so it makes Aubrey’s heart balloon, filled with something lighter than air and floating up, up, up until it’s bumping her ribcage.

“We- Dani, are we getting married?” Just saying it is a kick in the gut. If a kick in the gut felt, like, totally fucking awesome.

“We don’t have to get married right now,” Dani clarifies. “But I mean. In the future? Absolutely. Hell fucking yes.”

“In the future,” Aubrey agrees. She shifts closer to Dani’s side, and her panties stick to her thigh. She grimaces, but it only lasts for a moment before that goofy smile overpowers it. “For right now I need to clean myself up a little.”

“I’d be down for that,” Dani says. She’s smiling too. “But. In the future, you know.”

“In the future,” Aubrey answers again. They stand together, making their way to the shower. And they don’t stop holding hands.

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this in one go. i'll be honest, i'm way behind on amnesty because i've been busy, but i miss these girls and needed to give 'em some love regardless. this takes place mid-cannon, but i haven't listened to amnesty recently enough to tell you where exactly that would go. use your imagination, folks.
> 
> anyways! this was a fun write and i hope it's a fun read. please please PLEASE leave me comments, kudos, or bookmarks. comments especially are my lifeblood and i've been feeling pretty down on my writing recently, so anything helps. follow or just message me on tumblr @dungeondyke: i take requests! i might not write everything but i'll do my best to at least write a little somethin' somethin'. thank you again for reading, have a great day or afternoon or night or whatever!


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